Just because Doug Parker was the key player in those 2 mergers AWA is dead. Once they became US Air lots of the employees of US started to resent the fact that the AWA employees got preferential treatment. On a recent AA flight a few of the flight attendants stated "If you are not Phoenix based you are the scum of the earth at AA!" this was from one that is out of Dallas. The culture has turned quite toxic at AA so much that felt there customer service was worse than United when they were going through bankruptcy.
Still my favorite American Airlines livery was on the old Condors with the dark Blue, Orange and White trim. It was the first to use the lightning strike down the side of the fuselage. This has made me recall the first American Airlines 707 that came back to Renton with the paint peeling off the nose. The old Dupont auto paint wasn't hacking the changes from plus 70 deg. to minus 70 deg. and 600mph in a matter of minutes. It required a new paint process to make it work. Just one of many things that we learned in 1957-1958.
I had the pleasure of flying the KC-135A at Castle AFB! We'd push the power up to a certain EPR and then the water would start. The noise was deafening. The airplane vibrated so much you could barely read the instrument panel. After what seemed like 25 seconds the airplane would slowly start to accelerate. At that time we had a navigator and part of his takeoff duties was to hack the clock and give us a countdown until water run out. You had to have the gear and flaps up and essentially zero climb when the water ran out. Things suddenly got very quiet and it felt like two of the four engines quit running! What an experience! I couldn't believe how slowly the big jet accelerated, I'm sure the fact we were in the middle of California in the summer with temps in the 90s didn't help. I had just come from flying the A-10, another underpowered jet, and the KC-135A made the A-10 feel like a rocket ship.
When I was a kid in Puerto Rico, my dad had gotten privileges in the Pan Am Clipper Club in the terminal at SJU. Every time we went to the airport - he went quite often to pick up cargo - I would spend time in the club watching planes take off on what at the time was SJU's only runway, which was 10,000 feet long. It was appalling how much of the runway the early jets used before rotating, in a cloud of black smoke. And even though the big windows in the Clipper Club were noise-insulated, the roar of the engines was quite noticeable. A few years later, when the same aircraft switched to JT3D turbofans, the much shorter takeoff rolls and relative lack of noise and smoke were immediately apparent. (In fact, my dad told me about one flight he was taking to NYC where the pilot actually aborted the takeoff because he felt he was using too much of the runway. He taxiied back to the head end and tried again, successfully!)
I had the experience of being at the end of the runway at Larsen AFB when a maximum effort scramble took place with their B-52's and KC-135's. The shriek of the KC's was painful and seemed to be louder than the B-52's. The smoke was so thick after the first two or three launches that you couldn't see anything until an airplane burst out of it , usually heading left or right . A frightening sight.
When you watch the MITO sequence in the movie "A Gathering of Eagles", you get the same sensation. Each following B-52 seems to burst out of the smoke cloud on the runway as it takes off. It's probably the highlight of the movie.
I've never flown American, and I haven't flown United in years. Based on what I've read recently about both airlines, I don't think I really want to fly them. (Besides, I don't like their current liveries, anyway.) I'm happy with Delta and Southwest, which are almost what you have to fly out of ATL - between them they have probably 90% of all the flights here.
You learn something new everyday they say, and this was no exception, never heard of this technology. Read up on it, quite interesting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_707 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pratt_%26_Whitney_J57 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_injection_(engine)
From what I remember, the ADI initially had the affect of lowering blade clearance between the blade tip and case in the low stage compressor . It lowered the temperature in the burner cans, prevented pre-ignition and flame creep. Allowed a higher rate of fuel to be used without overheating.
Water injection was used on fighters too, those powered by the J-75 specifically, like the F-105 and F-106.
...and the J79 as in the F-4 Phantom II... Pilots in Vietnam knew that the Migs could see them for miles before sighting the aircraft by the long black exhaust plume... a real hindrance. I remember seeing a video of a Navy Hydrofoil that used J79 power... blasting along with a huge black exhaust plume from the stack.
Back on point... A great looking (IMO) livery, the third or fourth Continental. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_Airlines#/media/File:Continental_Airlines_B737-200_N7381F.jpg
Not the most attractive livery. The original 737 always brings up one of my favorite quotes by another pilot after an initial 737 took off, "Nice punt!"
Just one last thing to think about on the water injection is the water was distilled. 640 gallons on each takeoff.
Well, I made another error in the keel beam capacity by stating that it held 254 gallons. Darn typos get me all the time because I never make misteaks. I came close, though, I only missed it by 400 gallons. Yeah, that is a big keel beam and I should have checked my resources instead of relying on flash memory. ADI--Anti Detonation Injection. I think that I remembered that correctly.
Don't feel bad, j had to look it up myself. On a side note there are stories of regular and not distilled water being used, not a good outcome.
Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Love the L1011 w/RR engines Image Unavailable, Please Login
Jim, it's one of them SEGOOEY things that go from one thing to another without you knowing it. It is nice to see the old liveries but it's also nice to see things like the beautiful 727-200's.
I don't know what the story is here, but this is a photo I took in November 2009 at Washington National Airport (DCA) of a US Airways aircraft with the Piedmont logo on the tail. Upon checking, the Piedmont name and logo still operates thru American Airlines as a regional feeder airline on small airplanes and they even have their own web site. The logo reminds me of what some railroads did several years ago in painting their locomotives in liveries of predecessor railroads who were merged over the years. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piedmont_Airlines Image Unavailable, Please Login
In that case, consider this: while the introduction of jets in 1959 persuaded some airlines to come up with completely new liveries, such as Pan Am (with the famous blue globe) and United, Delta's famous "widget" scheme was not among them. As seen here, the DC-8 and CV-880 had new schemes, but were completely different aside from the fact that they used red and blue. Even the font types used for the "Delta Air Lines" legend were entirely different! Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
The widget first appeared in brochures advertising Delta's "Royal Jet Service" but did not appear on aircraft until Delta put the DC-8-50 in service in 1962, and the older DC-8s were repainted fairly quickly. But the 880s stuck to the scheme above well into the '60s, even beyond the time when the fuselage legend was shortened simply to "Delta". Only sometime thereafter were the 880s converted to the widget scheme. Note how in the brochure widget, the white area represents the DC-8's wings. Supposedly the blue field represented the sky, and the red field the exhaust from the jet engines! Image Unavailable, Please Login
Uniquely on the early DC-9s, Delta turned the widget so that it faced forward rather than up, even on the forward fuselage and the engines. The later DC-9s returned the widget to its normal orientation. This was not done on any other Delta type. Image Unavailable, Please Login
